Those 35 cows were hungry! It was mid-winter in Ordnance, Oregon. Mac was driving an old army surplus truck to a pea vine pit near Weston for a load of feed for the cows. The farmer he worked for had little money left and wanted to make every trip count, so Mac told the operator of the front-end loader at the pit to “heap ’em up” as he dumped them into the truck. The vines had sat in the pit for a few months now and were wet, pressed down and heavy. The poor old truck, built to carry four tons, was creaking under its load of 14 tons as Mac started back toward home.
After a few miles he came to a steep hill about two miles long and ending in a sharp curve. The highway had been blasted out of the hillside. Part way down the hill the land rose about 20 feet above the level of the road on either side.
Mac had driven this way quite a few times that winter, and usually he trusted the old truck. But this trip he carried such a heavy load pushing from behind that he could picture himself flying down that hill at 80 or 90 miles an hour and crashing into the enormous boulders that were heaped up beside the curve at the bottom! He decided he had better test his brakes.
There were none! He knew the hand brake didn’t work either, and he had already started on his way down the hill.
It’s wonderful to know that we are under the tender care of a loving Father if we trust in the Lord Jesus, and that we can look to Him for help whenever we need it. Mac needed it now! He prayed. It was then he noticed how the land rose in a little hill beside the highway not far ahead. If he left the road perhaps the truck would stop as it went up the little hill.
He was already going 40 or 45 MPH as he turned to the right, bounced over the ditch, and started going up. How relieved he felt to come to a safe stop —and he hadn’t lost a single pea vine!
Thankfully, the brakes weren’t too difficult to fix, and Mac was soon on his way again, thanking the Lord Jesus for keeping him safe and thinking of another hill that had meant eternal safety for him. As we travel along life’s road each one of us must pass Calvary’s hill. We stop there or we choose to pass by the Lord Jesus dying on the cross for our sins and go headlong down to destruction.
If Mac had missed that little hill there would have been no other place of safety, and he would surely have crashed into the boulders at the bottom. Hell is waiting at the bottom of the broad road that leads to destruction, but God is full of love and mercy. He has sent the Lord Jesus to die in our place. Won’t you stop at the feet of Jesus on Calvary’s hill and accept Him as your Saviour? He is the only one who can give you eternal safety.
ML-06/28/1987